butter

Health Benefits of Real Butter

Are you worried about your health? Contrary to popular belief, completely eliminating butter from your diet may be BAD for your health! Learn all the benefits of eating butter here! The origins of butter go back thousands of years to when our ancestors first started domesticating animals. In fact, the first written reference to butter was found on a 4500- year old limestone tablet illustrating how butter was made. In India, ghee (clarified butter) has been used as a staple food and cooking oil, and as a symbol of purity, worthy of offering to the gods in religious ceremonies for more than 5000 years. The Bible has references to butter as the product of milk from the cow, and of Abraham setting butter and milk from a calf before three angels who appeared to him on the plains of Mamre. For millennia, people around the globe have prized butter for its health benefits. So how did butter become a villain in the quest for good health? At the turn of our century, heart disease in America was rare. By 1960, it was our number one killer. Yet during the same time period, butter consumption had decreased - from eighteen pounds per person per year, to four. A researcher named Ancel Keys was the first to propose that saturated fat and cholesterol in the diet were to blame for coronary heart disease (CAD). Numerous subsequent studies costing hundreds of millions of dollars, have failed to conclusively back up this claim. Yet the notion that a healthy diet is one with minimal fat, particularly saturated fat, has persisted. While Americans drastically reduced their intake of natural animal fats like butter and meat, the processed food industry, particularly the low-fat food industry, proliferated. When we baby boomers were children, our concerned mothers began to replace butter with margarine. The margarine manufacturers told them it was the healthier alternative and mothers believed them. In those days no one asked, "where is the science to prove it? I want to know before I give this man-made, plastized stuff to my children. After all we humans have been eating butter for thousands of years." As a result, since the early 1970's, Americans' average saturated fat intake has dropped considerably, while rates of obesity, diabetes, and consequently, heart disease, have surged. Reducing healthy sources of dietary fat has contributed to a serious decline in our well-being, and those of us that speak out against the anti-fat establishment are still largely ignored.

Is Margarine Better than Butter?

No! This is a tragic myth. Butter is a completely natural food essential to your health - especially when you eat organic. Also, please make the extra effort to obtain high-quality organic, raw butter. Margarines, on the other hand, are a processed food, created chemically from refined polyunsaturated oils. The process used to make these normally liquid oils into spread-able form is called hydrogenation. Margarine and similar hydrogenated or processed polyunsaturated oils are potentially more detrimental to your health than any saturated fat. For more information on why you should avoid all processed oils read Why the Processing of Consumable Oils Has Devastated America's Health.

Include Real Butter as part of Your Lifestyle

As many of you already know, I am a strong proponent of including a variety of healthy oils and fats into our diet. Together they work as a team to supply our bodies with essential fatty acids for longevity, hormone balance, heart health, sharp vision, glowing moist skin and energy. The wonderful variety of oils and fats certainly include organic, preferably raw, butter. Cultured raw butter is even better. And why would I be so insistent that we eat butter? Take a look at the long list of the benefits we receive when we include it in our diet: Butter is rich in the most easily absorbable form of Vitamin A necessary for thyroid and adrenal health. Contains lauric acid, important in treating fungal infections and candida. Contains lecithin, essential for cholesterol metabolism. Contains anti-oxidants that protect against free radical damage. Has anti-oxidants that protect against weakening arteries. Is a great source of Vitamins E and K. Is a very rich source of the vital mineral selenium. Saturated fats in butter have strong anti-tumor and anti-cancer properties. Butter contains conjugated linoleic acid, which is a potent anti-cancer agent, muscle builder, and immunity booster. Vitamin D found in butter is essential to absorption of calcium. Protects against tooth decay. Is your only source of an anti-stiffness factor, which protects against calcification of the joints. Anti-stiffness factor in butter also prevents hardening of the arteries, cataracts, and calcification of the pineal gland. Is a source of Activator X, which helps your body absorb minerals. Is a source of iodine in a highly absorbable form. May promote fertility in women. Is a source of quick energy, and is not stored in our bodies adipose tissue. Cholesterol found in butterfat is essential to children's brain and nervous system development. Contains Arachidonic Acid (AA) which plays a role in brain function and is a vital component of cell membranes. Protects against gastrointestinal infections in the very young and the elderly.

Raw, Organic Butter is the Best

Believe me this is only a partial list. If a woman is pregnant, hopes to become pregnant or is nursing her baby, I think it should even become a law for her to eat butter for her baby's developing brain, bones and teeth. The best butter you can eat is raw, organic butter because pasteurization destroys nutrients. Cultured butter is full of health sustaining good bacteria like lactobacillus planterum, and lactococcus lactis. These microflora are essential for a healthy inner ecosystem.

Sources of Healthy Butter

Completely eliminating butter and other healthy animal source fats is NOT the way. It is not how our ancestors thrived, and not what nature intended. How much should you eat each day? Like sea salt, your own body will tell you how much to eat. If you crave it, eat it, your body needs it. If the quality is excellent you can feel confident it will be good for you and you'll soon see the benefits yourself. The raw butter will help you develop beautiful muscles. Properly made raw butter, preferably organic, is a great way of healing candida and other immune dysfunctions. And what's more, it's a heart-healthy, super-slimming, anti-aging way of life, which is crucial to your health as a whole.There will be much more on this subject and butter's own companion REAL buttermilk soon!

Sources:
1 History of Butter
http://www.dairygoodness.ca/en/consumers/products/butter/history-of-butter.htm
2 "Butter" from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butter#Worldwide
3 Princely Packets of Golden Health
http://webexhibits.org/butter/ref/MiltonEParker.pdf
4 Why Butter is Better
http://www.westonaprice.org/foodfeatures/butter.html
5 The Soft Science of Dietary Fat, Science Magazine, March 2001
http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/taubes.html#linktop
6 Ibid
7 Polyunsaturated Oils Increase Cancer Risk
http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/fats_and_cancer.html
8 From The Skinny on Fats
http://www.westonaprice.org/knowyourfats/skinny.html
and Why Butter is Better
http://www.westonaprice.org/foodfeatures/butter.html
9Fertility Awareness, Food, and Night-lighting
http://www.westonaprice.org/women/fertility.html and High Fat Dairy May Boost Fertility

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